What They Are Saying … about the Bradley Manning verdict

Army Pfc. Bradley Manning is escorted out of a courthouse in Fort Meade, Md., on July 30. (Patrick Semansky, Associated Press)

What some of the nation’s political commentators and editorial boards are saying about the acquittal of Bradley Manning:

Verdict good for freedom
Bradley Manning, the U.S. Army private who gave hundreds of thousands of secret U.S. documents to WikiLeaks, was found guilty this week by a military judge of more than a dozen crimes, including espionage. But Manning was acquitted of the most serious charge: “aiding the enemy.” The acquittal, as Slate’s Fred Kaplan explains, is good news for journalists whose leak-based reports, under the government’s rationale, would have been prosecutable as capital crimes. It’s also good news for freedom, human rights and common sense. The case for convicting Manning of aiding the enemy was preposterous.
— William Saletan, Slate

Government overreached
But the government also deserves a wrist slap. Rather than taking the win, the government tried to make a chilling example of Manning with the accusation that he was aiding and abetting the enemy. It was such an overreach. So much about Manning has the look and feel of a whistleblower and not a spy. Score a big loss for the government — a deserved one – for overreaching.— Jim Mitchell, Dallas Morning News

Whistle-blowers may be deterred
One might think the judge’s rejection of the aiding-the-enemy charge would temper the Obama administration’s unprecedented zeal for prosecuting disclosures of classified information. That seems unlikely. Whether the target is Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who exposed the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records, or Stephen Jin-Woo Kim, the State Department contractor suspected of leaking information about North Korea to Fox News, the administration seems determined to use criminal law to plug leaks even when they don’t result in provable harm to national security, an aggressive posture that may deter genuine whistle-blowers.
—Los Angeles Times editorialHe violated military law
Whether what Manning did was right or wrong in the broader book of morality, it did violate military law. He knew that; and, in his plea, he accepted responsibility for it, accepted his fate, but always insisted that he had no intention to aid the enemy. The military court’s assent on that point was wise, beneficial for free speech, and for the country.
— Fred Kaplan, Slate

Striking the right balance
It is a fitting outcome for Manning, who stole and exposed thousands of classified documents. But the judge’s reasoning has broader application, as well. It is a framework for assessing the actions not just of Manning but also of Edward Snowden and a host of lesser known leakers being pursued by the Obama administration as if they were spies. Like Manning, they violated secrecy laws. Like Manning, they said they did so with good intentions — and often with good results. But also like Manning, their actions can’t be ignored. The trick is striking the right balance in delivering justice for each.
— USA Today editorial
He should do time
Pfc. Bradley Manning was acquitted by a military judge Tuesday of aiding the enemy. That’s a good thing. But he could still spend decades behind bars for the biggest leak of classified documents in American history. That’s good, too.
— Newsday editorial

A staggering fact of the case
That a lowly soldier had security clearances sufficient to snatch files about detainees at Cuba’s Guantanamo Bay camp, half a million military field reports from Iraq and Afghanistan, and a quarter of a million diplomatic cables from the State Department remains one of the more staggering facts of the case.
— Tim Weiner, Bloomberg News

Bradley Manning is a whistleblower, plain and simple, he did the right thing. He did not go to Wikileaks first, but to his superior, then tried the main stream media, to no avail. Also the judge has been offered a higher position while deliberating Manning’s case. This is truly a travesty of justice.

Vincent Carroll is The Denver Post's editorial page editor. He has been writing commentary on politics and public policy in Colorado since 1982 and was originally with the Rocky Mountain News, where he was also editor of the editorial pages until that newspaper gave up the ghost in 2009.

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